


Chivalry

by madamebadger



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Chivalry, Developing Relationship, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff, Humor, Pranks and Practical Jokes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-24
Updated: 2015-01-24
Packaged: 2018-03-08 20:09:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3221807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madamebadger/pseuds/madamebadger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leliana is terrible. Josephine is not amused. And Cassandra is eager to help, but doesn't necessarily think things through. Fortunately, things work out better than one might expect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chivalry

**Author's Note:**

> Based on a bit of in-game banter in which it is revealed that Leliana ran a pair of Josephine's underpants up the flagpole. Assumes a new but established relationship between Cassandra and Josephine.

If anyone had asked Cassandra whether she was looking for Josephine as she wandered the gardens, she would have denied it—would, indeed, have indicated that she was perfectly capable of enjoying gardens for their own sakes. Inside her own head, she maintained the same thing… but was at least willing to acknowledge that she was _hoping_ to encounter Josephine. This—this thing between them, whatever it was, was still too new for her to feel entirely comfortable relying on, and yet when she was in Skyhold she still found herself seeking out Josephine daily, as though she was—like fresh air and sunlight and exercise—a requirement for Cassandra’s continued health and happiness. A requirement that she had been utterly unaware of until a scant few months ago, but still a requirement.

Sure enough, she found Josephine in the gardens. Unlike most of the times she had found Josephine there, though, Josephine was neither enjoying the flowers nor entertaining visiting dignitaries nor sitting with her writing-board drafting a letter in the sunlight. She was standing, arms folded firmly across her chest, looking up at the sky with an expression of sourness that did not seem entirely at home on her face.

Cassandra quashed her instinctive response, which was to offer to do violence to whoever had upset her. Josephine, like most people, was likely to take that amiss. Instead she said, “Josephine?” (It was new enough between them, yet, that she had to overcome her instinct to call her Lady Montilyet.)

“Cassandra,” Josephine said, and Cassandra was gratified to see her expression lighten. Then she returned her gaze to the sky, brows lowering in irritation once more. Cassandra followed her gaze, but all she could see was the roofline of Skyhold, stark against the blue sky.

“What’s troubling you?” she asked.

Josephine hesitated, then sighed. "Leliana," she said, with a tight efficiency in her voice that meant that she was working hard to keep her temper (and wanted you to know it), "had my underwear hung at the top of the banner pole."

 _Oh_. Now Cassandra could see it. It was a bit hard to tell from so far away, but now that she knows where to look, she could tell. From this far below it was hard to make out anything but a ruffled bit of pink.

"I am given to understand," Josephine continued with the same icy precision, "that Sera was responsible for liberating them from my possession--apparently when they were on the way back from the laundry--and turning them over to Leliana, but the banner pole was entirely Leliana's idea.” She unfolded her arms. “I am not partial to violence, but the next time I see her I may well shake her until her teeth rattle."

Leliana inspired pants-wetting terror in most of the troops, and with some good reason. Even Cassandra, who had worked with her in one capacity or another for years, generally tried to avoid getting too flagrantly on the Left Hand's bad side. (While she would not admit it to anyone else, Leliana’s calm warning of what would happen if Cassandra was to be romantically _unkind_ to Josephine was frankly rather sobering—not that it had changed anything; she would rather cut off her own hand than see Josephine hurt, even so early as this.) So she was charmed that Josephine could speak of such a thing without even a quaver. "I'm sorry."

"It is not so much of an inconvenience, but it is embarrassing," Josephine said, so plaintively that Cassandra just _had_ to do something. Soothing words were not necessarily her forte… but action was, and surely this was a problem that could be solved by some decisive action.

"I'll get them back for you," she said, starting forward.

"Cassandra--"

"It's no bother," Cassandra added, waving a hand. She may not have been much of a romantic heroine, but at least this sort of thing she could do. (Perform a minor but visible bit of heroics, right a wrong, preserve a beautiful lady's dignity? It was pleasantly reminiscent of something Varric might write, not that she would ever tell him so; he would be smug for weeks if she did. But the possibility of earning a kiss for her chivalry, too, had not escaped her.)

She reached the foot of the banner pole in short order. It was quite tall but not terribly thick, which promised relatively easy climbing; its wood was fairly rough, which would allow her more purchase. She hadn't climbed a tree in a long time, but she had once been quite good at it, and she still kept in practice climbing other things, like ropes and cliffs. _Shouldn't be too bad_ , she thought. She hesitated, then stripped off her tunic--it was padded, to protect her from the sharp edges of the armor she usually wore over it, which meant it was too bulky for this kind of athletics--but left her leather gloves on to protect her hands. In nothing but her undershirt, the Skyhold breeze brought out gooseflesh on her bare arms, but she'd warm up quickly with the exertion. She stripped off her empty scabbard and belts to lighten herself, rubbed her hands together to warm them up, and began to climb.

* * *

Cassandra was nearly halfway up the banner pole when Leliana wandered up to stand next to Josephine. She was eating an apple and looking much less harried than usual. She followed Josephine's gaze upwards.

"What--?" she began.

"Cassandra," Josephine said with some satisfaction, "is getting my underthings back."

They watched together in silence. Even at this distance, the muscles in Cassandra's arms were clearly and delightfully visible as she hauled herself up the pole. Her biceps stood out with each pull, the sculpted sinews of her shoulders working beneath her sleeveless undershirt.

"It can be lowered, you know. That's how I got them up in the first place; I certainly didn't climb."

"I know,” Josephine said. “I tried to tell her that."

It wasn’t just her arms and back, either. Cassandra's trousers were fairly snug, and now--without the extra material of her tunic in the way, or her scabbards or her extra belts with their pouches and so on--her legs were clearly visible. Her legs and also her fit, muscular backside. She had the pole clamped between her knees, and with each shimmy upward her thighs flexed, her calves tensed, muscles working smoothly across her whole body. She was a study in toned, trained physical excellence, rising inexorably hand over hand above Skyhold.

"Exactly how hard did you try to stop her?" Leliana asked, conversationally, crunching a bite out of her apple.

Josephine tried to maintain her look of innocence, but she could actually _feel_ it slipping. Clearly Leliana could see it slipping, too, because she started to giggle, and after a moment of attempting to maintain her composure, Josephine gave in and laughed as well.

"In fairness," Leliana said when they had gotten control of themselves, "the mechanism has been improved, for certain values of 'improved,' and it's far from obvious to find and even less obvious to use."

"Dagna?"

"Dagna."

Sweat had dampened Cassandra’s thin undershirt and the blowing wind plastered it to her back. Josephine could see the angle of her shoulderblades, the striated muscles of her back, the almost-unbelievable flatness of her belly where the shirt stuck to it. She made a little noise and licked her lips, aware of Leliana grinning at her and not quite able to care.

"I take it I'm forgiven, then?" Leliana said archly.

"You are forgiven," Josephine said. Cassandra paused a moment, bracing herself with one arm, and the posture brought out every single muscle from her forearm down to her flanks in stark relief. Josephine felt suddenly very lightheaded. 

They both watched in respectful silence until Cassandra began moving again. Leliana took another thoughtful bite of her apple. "I must say I am almost jealous. Maker knows that Cassandra is a difficult and occasionally infuriating person-- _I_ certainly couldn't be romantically involved with her, we'd kill each other within days--but that kind of physical prowess, well.” She caught Josephine’s eye and smirked. “It can be quite a lot of fun in the bedroom, I do know that."

"We, ah. Hadn't gotten that far yet." Although right now Josephine couldn't quite remember why not. "Actually, I suppose I _could_ still be angry at you that this is the context in which she will first see my underthings."

Leliana clucked her tongue. "Take it from your old friend who is living vicariously through your love life: that is a sign that you ought to _speed things up_."

Without even looking, Josephine reached out to smack Leliana on the shoulder.

* * *

Cassandra was at the top of the pole when she realized that she had, in her rush to do something grand and romantic for Josephine, not quite thought this through properly. Or really at all.

She tightened the grip of her legs around the pole and braced herself with one hand. She had a good head for heights and wasn't particularly _afraid_ of them, but even so she had become increasingly aware that she was a long way from the ground, and that the courtyard flagstones were not likely to provide a soft landing were she to lose her balance, or her grip.

Leliana had clipped Josephine's undergarments to the top of the pole. They were deep rose pink and silky, decorated with lacy bits that probably had some fancy fashion name that Cassandra didn't know. Cassandra had never owned anything like them in her life, preferring simple linen undergarments when she bothered with them at all.

(Cassandra was trying very hard not to think of how they would look on Josephine--how Josephine would look wearing these and nothing else, the rose color bringing out the warmth of her skin, her dark wavy hair loose and tumbling over her breasts--no. Focus. Getting distracted and falling would not be a boon to her prospective sex life.)

Of course, having rescued the underwear, she didn't know what to _do_ with it. She needed both hands to climb down, and she had removed all of her belts with their useful pouches. Climbing down with the panties clenched between her teeth was undeniably romantic but far too risqué, especially as she was, after all, in public. She could hardly just let them drop: light and ruffled as they were, they'd just blow away and get caught on some other high spot and embarrass Josephine further. After a moment, weighing several bad options, Cassandra stuffed them down the front of her undershirt, securing them under her breastband. That was a bit risqué too, but at least not in a public way.

It was when she glanced down to prepare for her descent that she realized that she had an audience. Josephine was there, of course, and Leliana, damn her, but also others. Sera, grinning like a loon (not that she could see that far, but she was sure it was true), and Dorian, probably just as amused, and any number of off-duty soldiers and staff, and Iron Bull and all the Chargers, and--didn't these people have better things to do with their time? The Inquisitor ought to be keeping them more busy, Maker take it all. With her luck Vivienne was watching from her balcony and preparing to grade Cassandra on the stylishness of her climb.

Josephine, though, head craned back looking at her--Josephine made it worthwhile.

She gritted her teeth, sighed, and began the climb down.

When her boots finally hit the ground, she realized that she _really_ hadn't thought things through properly. She could hardly hand over the underwear in front of all these people, especially since she would have to go digging in her own breastband to get them out again. Probably Josephine didn't want them back right now, sweaty as they undoubtedly were, anyway. And everyone was looking. She felt her face heat up, hesitated, tried to figure out what to say, and finally gave up and said, "Josephine--"

It turned out that she didn't need to think of anything to say, because her mouth was suddenly occupied. Josephine kissed her with such enthusiasm that her chain of office banged hard against Cassandra's stomach before being trapped between them. Josephine's lips were soft and warm as always but right now they were also eager to the point of hunger, and Cassandra's head spun even as instinct made her kiss back with just as much fervor.

She was dimly aware that her audience was clapping. She was acutely aware that there were noticeably fewer layers between herself and Josephine than usual. Her arm tightened around Josephine's waist, feeling the brocade and--beneath it--Josephine's warmth against the skin of her inner arm. Josephine made a tiny noise, not quite a whimper, and Cassandra pulled her even closer, thrumming with adrenaline.

(It was far from the first time they'd kissed, but always before it had been considerably more hesitant and also profoundly discreet--not precisely a secret but also nothing public. It had the potential to raise questions, and to make Josephine's life quite a lot more difficult, and so Cassandra had kept quiet for her sake. It made her absolutely giddy, now, that Josephine had chosen to kiss her here, at midday in the courtyard with an audience.)

When they finally broke apart, Cassandra wasn't sure what to say. Josephine, beautiful clever Josephine, solved the problem. She met Cassandra's gaze, eyes hooded and dark and mouth curving into a smile just this side of wicked, and said, "Perhaps you could bring them to me privately, later?"

Cassandra's mouth went dry. "I can do that," she whispered.

**Author's Note:**

> At some point Cassandra is going to figure out that there obviously must be an easier way to get things up and down the banner pole and feel like a bit of an idiot. But given how things turned out, I doubt she will be too upset about it.


End file.
